Re: Join the not-knowers, was RE: Giant anti-war demonstration in Melbourne

From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lee@piclab.com)
Date: Mon Feb 17 2003 - 11:34:27 MST

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    > (Rafal Smigrodzki <rafal@smigrodzki.org>):
    >
    > ### And I am another (tending a little bit against the war, but not much). I
    > understand that Lee Crocker, and Greg Burch don't know for sure either
    > (please forgive me if I am misrepresenting anybody's opinions).
    >
    > I feel I am in good company here, with the not-knowers.

    I'm still in the undecided camp; if my rhetoric lately has been
    somewhat hawkish, it's only because I'm truly embarrassed at the
    pathetic quality of arguments I see from the other side. There
    probably are some legitimate arguments for not acting right away,
    but all I've heard from the anti-war crowd is the usual pacifist
    drivel that war is wrong, there must be a better way, yada yada.
    I also totally reject any notion that the present government of
    Iraq is legitimate and deserves respect under international law,
    and the notion that action might actually increase the threat of
    terrorism is predicated on the ridiculous notion that those who
    hate us have or need legitimate reasons.

    I am very definitely /not/ a pacifist. Peace is a side-effect of
    freedom and justice, not something to value in its own right.
    Whether or not forcibly removing Hussein from power now rather
    than waiting for his regime to die off by itself will result in
    more freedom and justice in the world is a debatable issue.

    I'm also concerned that we've left Israel out of the debate. If
    anyone has a legitimate case for action, it's Israel, who is much
    closer and had scuds tossed at her directly last time around,
    and they have much more experience in setting up a reasonably free
    government in the area. I'd much rather see the US lending aid to
    an Israeli-led force to remove Hussein. But maybe that's really
    what we're doing and we're just agreeing to take the heat publicly. 

    -- 
Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lee/>
"All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past,
are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified
for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC

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